What really happened prior to 'Snowball Earth'?ScienceDaily Share In a study published in the journal Geology, scientists at the University of Miami Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science suggest that the large changes in the carbon isotopic composition of carbonates which occurred prior to the major climatic event more than 500 million years ago, known as 'Snowball Earth,' are unrelated to worldwide glacial events.More

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2012 Officer Election ResultsGS Share By a vote of the Geochemical Society membership, Barbara Sherwood Lollar has been elected Vice-President and Rodney Ewing, Catherine Jeandel and Edward Young have been elected non-officer directors. The election was conducted by email ballot from 14 December 2011 through Jan. 10, 2012. Of the 3,588 ballots issued, a total of 995 ballots were submitted. View the full 2012 Board of Directors.

Development surveyGS Share The Geochemical Society needs your input to prioritize future programming efforts. Please take our survey by Feb. 23, 2012. For more information see the Development Committee Prospectus

Goldschmidt NewsGS Share The plenary speakers for the upcoming Montreal Goldschmidt Conference have been announced. The 2012 Gast Lecturer is Ros Rickaby, University of Oxford. Plenary lectures will be presented by Robert Howarth, Cornell University, and Terry Engelder, Penn State, who will discuss the topic of shale gas; Lee Kump, Penn State, on the Geochemistry of Extinction; and Larry Cathles, Cornell, and Patrice Christmann (link not available), BRGM, will discuss the future of ore resources. The opening plenary lecture will be given by Bernard Bourdon, Ecole Normale Superieure de Lyon, President of the European Association of Geochemistry.

Latest News

Death Valley's big bang: Volcano "potentially active"National Geographic Share A mile and a half wide and 600 feet deep, California's Ubehebe Crater came explosively into being long ago when rising magma hit water. The bomblike steam eruption produced a mushroom cloud that, as it collapsed, sent rocky debris flowing out sideways at 200 miles an hour to a distance of a few kilometers, according to a geologic analysis of rock deposits at the site, study co-author Brent Geohring said. The question is, when?More

Scientists see new climate clues on Saturn's moon TitanAlaska Dispatch Share The discovery of intriguing differences among vast fields of sand dunes on Saturn's moon Titan is opening a window on the haze-shrouded satellite's geology and climate, researchers say.
Radar images from NASA's Cassini orbiter reveal that the size and spacing of the dunes change depending on the latitude of the dune fields and the elevation of the land on which they sit. The findings may help uncover the distribution of winds on the moon and yield clues to help resolve a long-standing debate over how and where the sand itself formed, according to the team reporting the results in the January issue of the journal Icarus.
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Dawn spacecraft offers first look at giant asteroid's chemistryAstronomy Share The NASA Dawn spacecraft's close-up study of the giant asteroid Vesta is offering researchers their first look at the elemental composition of this ancient protoplanet. Vesta is the second-most massive body in the main asteroid belt and has remained intact since its formation more than 4.5 billion years ago.More

Hundreds of meteorites uncovered in AntarcticaFox News Share A gang of heavily insulated scientists has wrapped up its Antarctic expedition and have bagged more than 300 space rocks.
They are participants in the Antarctic Search for Meteorites program, or ANSMET for short. Since 1976, ANSMET researchers have been recovering thousands of meteorite specimens from the East Antarctic ice sheet.
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Curtin University geologists make a 'shocking' discoveryPhysOrg.com Share Research led by Curtin University geologists has uncovered a wealth of new evidence in the mineral zircon from lunar rock samples recovered during NASA's Apollo missions, revealing indisputable proof of meteorite collisions on the Moon.More

Scientists use core samples from Wyoming to understand what caused runaway global warming 56 million years agoCasper Star-Tribune Share As the planet enters a new phase of climate change, scientists in two countries are working with core samples drilled in Wyoming to understand what caused a pattern of runaway warming, sometimes called the "fever period," 56 million years ago.
For reasons unknown, during the transition between the Paleocene and Eocene epochs, a sudden surge of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere prompted an extreme version of global warming, producing droughts and floods, widespread species extinctions and a redistribution of planetary life.
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Study: Fracking risk is exaggeratedNewScientist Share Frack away, there's no reason not to. Two of the main objections to "fracking" for shale gas have been blown out of proportion, according to British geologists.
Hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, involves pumping water, sand and chemicals into methane-rich shale deposits around 2 kilometers underground to liberate natural gas. It has been accused of contaminating drinking water with methane and chemicals, and causing minor earthquakes.More